The Best Picture winners 1927 – 2016: The winners (and the biggest losers)

By Alex Wiggan

This Sunday, the 90th Academy Awards will take place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. This means, this Sunday, for the 90th time, one film will be awarded the title of Best Picture – a much-coveted award indeed.

But what of the past winners? Who were they and when did they win the title of Best Picture? Below is a list of all the past winners of the Best Picture award, running from 1927 through 2016.

In addition to this list, is a selection of the category’s biggest losers – iconic films which missed out on the award. Keep reading to find out who won… and who didn’t.

The Best Picture winners 1927 – 2016:

1927/28 – Wings

1928/29 – The Broadway Melody

1929/30 – All Quiet on the Western Front

1930/31 – Cimarron

1931/32 – Grand Hotel

1932/33 – Cavalcade

1934 – It Happened One Night

1935 – Mutiny on the Bounty

1936 – The Great Ziegfeld

1937 – The Life of Emile Zola

1938 – You Can’t Take It with You

1939 – Gone with the Wind

1940 – Rebecca

1941 – How Green Was My Valley

1942 – Mrs. Miniver

1943 – Casablanca

1944 – Going My Way

1945 – The Lost Weekend

1946 – The Best Years of Our Lives

1947 – Gentleman’s Agreement

1948 – Hamlet

1949 – All the King’s Men

1950 – All About Eve

1951 – An American in Paris

1952 – The Greatest Show on Earth

1953 – From Here to Eternity

1954 – On the Waterfront

1955 – Marty

1956 – Around the World in 80 Days

1957 – The Bridge on the River Kwai

1958 – Gigi

1959 – Ben-Hur

1960 – The Apartment

1961 – West Side Story

1962 – Lawrence of Arabia

1963 – Tom Jones

1964 – My Fair Lady

1965 – The Sound of Music

1966 – A Man for All Seasons

1967 – In the Heat of the Night

1968 – Oliver!

1969 – Midnight Cowboy

1970 – Patton

1971 – The French Connection

1972 – The Godfather

1973 – The Sting

1974 – The Godfather Part II

1975 – One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

1976 – Rocky

1977 – Annie Hall

1978 – The Deer Hunter

1979 – Kramer vs. Kramer

1980 – Ordinary People

1981 – Chariots of Fire

1982 – Gandhi

1983 – Terms of Endearment

1984 – Amadeus

1985 – Out of Africa

1986 – Platoon

1987 – The Last Emperor

1988 – Rain Man

1989 – Driving Miss Daisy

1990 – Dances with Wolves

1991 – The Silence of the Lambs

1992 – Unforgiven

1993 – Schindler’s List

1994 – Forrest Gump

1995 – Braveheart

1996 – The English Patient

1997 – Titanic

1998 – Shakespeare in Love

1999 – American Beauty

2000 – Gladiator

2001 – A Beautiful Mind

2002 – Chicago

2003 – The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

2004 – Million Dollar Baby

2005 – Crash

2006 – The Departed

2007 – No Country for Old Men

2008 – Slumdog Millionaire

2009 – The Hurt Locker

2010 – The King’s Speech

2011 – The Artist

2012 – Argo

2013 – 12 Years a Slave

2014 – Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

2015 – Spotlight

2016 – Moonlight

What’s interesting to note about the list above is the simple fact that not all of the past winners of the Best Picture award are all that memorable. Sure, you’ve heard the names of most of the films on this list, but can you actually say you know them all?

Really?

Image: Lucasfilm

What’s perhaps even more interesting to note are the films which were nominated for Best Picture in their respective years, but didn’t win!

For example, Star Wars was nominated for Best Picture in 1977, but lost out to Annie Hall. And Star Wars isn’t alone; some of the biggest ‘losers’ of the Best Picture award include: The Wizard of Oz, Citizen Kane, It’s A Wonderful Life, To Kill a Mockingbird, Mary Poppins, The Exorcist, Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Ghost, Beauty and the Beast, The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, The Sixth Sense, Moulin Rouge!, Avatar, Toy Story 3 and The Martian.

Yep, all of these films were nominated for Best Picture, yet all missed out on the top spot. How crazy is that?

Think about the amount of times you’ve watched Star Wars, Mary Poppins, Beauty and the Beast or Raiders of the Lost Ark – now compare this number to the number of times you’ve watched some of the other films on the Best Picture list. It differs greatly, doesn’t it?

Perhaps the true test of time isn’t in the title of Best Picture, but in how the movie appeals to audiences over the years.